Labor Day Blowout

Labor Day is the last official weekend of summer at our beach house community.  There is lots of celebrating for kids and adults alike.  On Saturday we got to enjoy bouncing houses and a carnival complete with snow cones for the kids.   Then it was dinner with our all beach friends. On Sunday we had our second annual beach bash down at the bay beach where the kids (and adults) got to kayak and ride the SUPs (Stand Up Paddleboards).  It is amazing how many kids they can get standing up on one of those SUPs at the same time.  Then Sunday night we had a camp out... complete with tent, sleeping bags, smores, and fireworks.  It was definitely not a rough weekend.  In fact, the weather was nearly perfect and the companionship second to none.

First Day of First Grade

Again, Lily was so excited to start school again this year.  Her new teacher (Ms. Ziadi) seems wonderful and she was so excited to see all her school friends again, including her good friend Root below.  As you can see, her bus stop is a pretty busy place in the mornings.  Looks much like my metro stop.

Night out on the town

D.C. hosts a restaurant week twice a year where you can get some incredible deals on great food at the best restaurants in town.  So what better reason to take Dad to Morton's for some good steak.  Which actually turned out to be not so great, but better luck next time.  At least he got to see his two girls dressed up for the evening.

(Panda)monium

This weekend we decided to hit the National Zoo on Sunday.  Yes, this was just a random pick for us.  But just because we were coming to the zoo, several excited things happened.  On Saturday night, our mommy Panda had not one but two babies.  Then, our current two year old baby panda, Bao Bao was celebrating his birthday as well.  The combination of these two events made the entire zoo feel panda crazy.  There were birthday celebrations (yes, seriously crazy people talking to the pandas), tons of media wanting to interview every person visiting.  However, the panda bug got us pretty excited too.  So much that Lily even dressed like a panda and then ended up getting her face painted as well.  All in all, it was an amazing panda day.

2 Year Old Bao Bao eating his birthday sugar cane

5 year old Lily celebrating Pandamonium

While it looks like I took the entire summer off...

I really did in fact work most of the summer.  I enjoyed a whole week out with one of my teams doing a book distribution in Pittsburg.  We distributed over 650,000 books in 4.5 days.  Yes, thats a lot of box moving, pallet jack wrangling, bending, lifting and all around feet hurting kind of days.  Thank goodness for some pain reliever.  Then I also got to make a trip to Oklahoma City with a couple co-workers for some partnership meetings.  It was HOT in Oklahoma City, but I was in great company.

Pittsburgh with some of our high school volunteers (they are learning in high school how to prepare for warehousing jobs... amazing program)

We were also blessed with a plethora of high school church volunteers for the entire week

Oklahoma City (this is a lake with a light house? Interesting.)

Coworkers Carey, Bryan and myself

Our new Florida digs

Yes, we bought a lot in Florida (only 1 mile from the beach).  Yes, we are building a house on said lot. Yes, we have a builder.  Yes, after a short 36 hour trip by Kim, everything is now picked out for the house (cabinets, counters, flooring, pool, etc.).  Yes, hopefully... the house will be done in time for spring break next year.  Can't wait for everyone to help us enjoy it.

While I was visiting on my short 36 hour whirlwind trip, I actually got to take a walk from our property out to Bonita Beach.  I can tell you that I have absolutely no buyers remorse.  The beach is beautiful and there are a bunch of restaurants and things right on the way to the beach.  I couldn't feel luckier even if I won the lottery.

Here is the nearly 1/2 acre lot.  Yes... it will get cleared soon.

And here is the beach that is only a 1 mile walk/bike ride.  

Annual day at the museum

This is the second year in a row that we have got to join my work friends (Elizabeth and Susan) and their daughters (Simone & Fiona), now also Lily's friends... for a day at the museum.  Susan is an art expert and used to work at the National Gallery of Art, in addition with other galleries, so she provided a special tour of a traveling exhibit at the Gallery.  Afterwards we all got to lunch together as well.  It was a wonderful day.